Hovis workers in BFAWU rising up in strikes against zero hours contracts

22 August 2013

Hundreds of workers in the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union (BFAWU) at a Hovis bakery in Wigan are set to strike back from 28 against the introduction of zero hour contracts, following redundancies and cuts to pay and hours.

They plan for three separate hits of week long strikes, firstly from 28 August to 4 September, then from 11 to 18 September and then again from 25 September to 2 October. Strikes will start from 6am.

BFAWU members make up 230 of the 357 employees at the Hovis bakery. Agency workers were brought in almost immediately after the redundancy of nearly 30 workers in April. These agency workers are on zero hours contracts.

These workers are showing how to take on the scandal of zero hours contracts.

1 comment

John Stott said:

Companies are jumping on the zero-hours bandwagon, cheered on by Cameron’s government. The BFAWU tried to tackle this issue in 2011 and with honourable exceptions, neither the politicians nor the press were remotely interested. Now look where are in 2013. This could have been nipped in the bud 2 years ago. Unless Unions and the general public stand together on this, zero-hour contracts will become the norm. We can’t rely on the mainstream press and politicians to fight our corner. We need to take responsibility ourselves and apply sufficient pressure for companies to back away from this vile employment concept.